


the opposite of the opposite: or mythbusters, with maki nishikino

by discopolice



Category: Love Live! School Idol Project
Genre: F/F, Tsunderes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-08
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-05-25 10:14:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6190984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/discopolice/pseuds/discopolice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shrine makeouts in the autumn, teenage feelings, and thoughts on yuri.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the opposite of the opposite: or mythbusters, with maki nishikino

_Myth: Maki Nishikino isn’t weak to a woman’s charms._

_Fact: Nozomi Tojo looks absurdly good in a shrine maiden’s uniform._

It’s not like Maki hasn’t noticed before – she noticed the first time she saw it, how well red and white blanket a full figure. Still, that was back before—before any of _this_ started, this whole romantic thing between them. Now that she _knows_ the sweetness of Nozomi’s voice on her neck, the way the curve between waist and hip feels under her palms, it is harder to ignore the way those things move as Nozomi tends to the shrine: how she sings with voice high and sweet, moving in rhythm to her own beat.

( _Myth: Shrine maidens are supposed to be pure. Fact: She_ has _to know the effect this has on Maki, doesn’t she? It doesn’t matter that she doesn’t even know Maki is there, or that neither of them have ever had this sort of relationship before!_ )

It was hard, at first, for Maki to reconcile the teasing, motherly Nozomi with the diligence and steadfastness she sees here; now, though, she knows that the Nozomi she is watching right now is the same Nozomi that steals kisses from her behind the rest of μ’s backs. She’s the same Nozomi that gets that charmingly shy look on her face, the same Nozomi content to stay in the shadows but who so beautifully can take the limelight, too--

\--Caught up in thought, she doesn’t realize Nozomi has disappeared from her line of sight until there are hands on her breasts. _I should have known_ , she thinks, even as she screams in surprise and Nozomi cackles.

“They’re getting bigger,” Nozomi whispers in her ear, and Maki doesn’t know whether she’s touched or wants to die. She feels Nozomi’s chest pressed into her back, the wisp of twin-tails falling closer to her shoulders. For a moment, she wonders if Nozomi is going to call her on the way her heartbeat quickens, if she can even feel it through the thick of her blazer.

The touch is gone as quickly as it came, and Maki kind of hates that she misses it.

“Here to train on your own? Praying for something good?” Nozomi still hasn’t dropped the broom, nor stopped the way she’s swaying her hips.

“I’m just praying for luck on exams,” Maki says, a blush hot on her face. _No, Nishikino Maki, look her in the face rather than elsewhere._ “Don’t think too much of it.” Their exams aren’t for weeks, and they both know that; it’s as though she speaks in a code, but a code they both recognize instantly.

“So you missed me,” Nozomi says, looking her in the eyes, and Maki’s shoved in the face of her feelings for a moment. She doesn’t dwell too much on it – Maki can tell she’s a little embarrassed too – but she does say, “It’s only 300 yen to draw a fortune for love!”

\--And then Maki gets sick of chalking things like that up to _fortune_ , pulls Nozomi in by both twin-tails, and kisses her on the lips. She makes sure not to miss the way Nozomi’s eyes widen, or the gasp into her mouth as Maki insistently pushes forward. By the time they break, Nozomi’s back is to the wall, Maki’s hands are around their neck, and they are breathless.

“Oh,” Nozomi says, and Maki feels the heat of her breath. “Your love fortune is looking pretty good today.”

_Myth: Maki Nishikino can never take initiative in love._

_Fact: She can, if the time is right and the reaction is as cute as that one was._

After another kiss, not quite as long as the first but just as sweet, Nozomi guiltily looks to the broom she dropped along the path and mutters, “I’m still supposed to be working.” It’s a half-hearted protest, and they both know it.

“Geez, we haven’t been alone in a week, you know,” Maki says, with a petulant pout more like a ten-year-old than a young woman. Maybe a few months ago, Maki could have (and did) go weeks without even thinking of things like this; that was before Nozomi made her way into her life, before Nozomi filled in all the cracks of her soul as easily as water. It’s a little pathetic, she thinks, that she can’t go a week without wanting to kiss Nozomi silly.

Nozomi would say it’s a little perfect.

Needless to say, Nozomi finds it _very_ difficult to resist that pout. They’re kissing again in less than a second, pressed front to front, Nozomi’s knee finding its way between Maki’s legs to pull her closer. For the first two kisses, their movements stay chaste, tentative; then Nozomi’s lips part around another gasp, and Maki takes the opportunity to meet their tongues halfway.

From there, it is lazily roaming hands and sweetly-taken, open-mouthed kisses, and then trying clumsily to get closer to one another when even the infinitesimal distance between them becomes too much. One hand on the back of Nozomi’s head, the other at her hip, Maki feels a distinct _need_ to close the gap and become one; it throbs hot in her belly, the desire to press their tongues more firmly, their chests close enough they can feel each other’s heartbeat through the flesh there. Neither of them has ever been able to _really_ be honest, but this is the closest they will get: Maki taking cues from facts rather than words, the fact of Nozomi’s presence and the tangibility of her kiss.

(And maybe Nozomi’s uniform starts to loosen with the friction, causing her sleeve to slip and expose a pale shoulder, but Maki doesn’t mind. She’s seen it well enough in their live outfits, but this way she gets to _touch_. That sends a little thrill down her spine.)

They break away, and Maki sees it again: that shy look on Nozomi’s face, the one she gets when she wants to interact with something but doesn’t know how. It’s only for a moment, and Maki can barely take it in before she’s burying that cute expression in the crook between Maki’s neck and shoulder, kissing and sucking. Maki clings to her like a dancer fits to a song, each meek gasp in tune, each clumsy press of their bodies somehow in perfect rhythm.

There is a spiritual power to it, this – like it was fate for them to cross paths, fate for u’s to form, fate for these two people to find each other in the whirlwinds of their respective lives. Maybe Nozomi saw it in her cards, once. Maybe whatever gods there are knew that Maki needed an anchor, or she’d speed forward without realizing her true feelings. Maybe they knew that Nozomi needed an anchor, Maki thinks dryly, or she’d probably float away.

_Myth: Magic isn’t real._

_Fact: Magic is in the meeting of two hearts; magic is when they beat as one. Magic is in the symphony you create over that beat._

The gate proves weak shelter when it begins to rain, whistling wind and little patters on immaculately-swept pavement. (To tell the truth, Maki hadn’t even noticed the way the sky darkened; she’d chalked it up to the way her senses had narrowed when Nozomi kissed her back. Blaming Nozomi seems like a good idea, at least.) Maki is the first to pull away when she feels it on her neck, right atop where Nozomi had kissed a little red mark into the skin: it’s small enough she can cover it with her hair, but large enough that she’ll be self-conscious about it for the next week.

“It’s raining,” she says, ever Captain Obvious. She is self-conscious, now, patting her frizzed hair down and wondering if she has a comb; but she sees Nozomi about to tease her as her hand reaches for her bag, so she stops. “We should… We should probably go inside.”

“But kissing in the rain is so _romantic,_ isn’t it?” Nozomi says; there’s that gently-prodding lilt still in her voice. “Hmhm, or should I get an umbrella and we can sit under it, like when you write your name and your classmate’s under an umbrella in your—“

“That’s ridiculous,” Maki says, putting two fingers to Nozomi’s mouth and looking away pointedly. She’s red around the tips of her ears, and Nozomi probably thinks it’s _cute_. “I can’t believe I was willingly kissing you two seconds ago. Geez.”

She doesn’t want to mention that it’s been her dream since she was young, things like kissing in the rain and sharing umbrellas. She was a girl once, too, with a full heart and a daydream like a melody in her ears; to this day, that melody rings through her body, her brain, her _soul_. Still, she wonders if it’d break the spell if she stopped fighting it, so she keeps her mouth shut.

(Besides, Nozomi already knows. She always knows. Maki has literally no idea how she does it. Maybe, just for a moment, it’s okay to believe in spiritual nonsense like magic.)

Still, Maki feels a _little_ bad when she sees that uncertainty creep into Nozomi’s eyes for a few seconds, so she fits their hands together and squeezes. Nozomi’s grip tightens, too, like she really doesn’t want to let go. (Maki wonders if she really wants to keep going like this, making out in the rain until the sun sets, until they can’t see anything but far-away streetlamps and the shimmer in each other’s eyes--)

But instead, Nozomi takes her inside, where the wind isn’t so punishing to her hair. Their sides do not leave where they are pressed, because it has been a week without any time to steal for themselves, and Maki hates public displays of affection just as much as she hates having to show weakness. None of the other members of μ’s really know how deep their relationship goes, and Maki wants to keep it that way.

(Except Honoka knows, because Honoka isn’t blind. She’s been pointedly trying to get them to do a duet for almost as long as they’ve been dating. Awkward.)

The beginnings of a sunset are visible from the spot they settle in, and Maki takes a moment to admire it while they are still hand-in-hand. It is stunning, honestly: red fading into purple, like their theme colors, or the way their hair looks when Nozomi rests her weary head on Maki’s shoulder. Nozomi notices it, too, probably, but Maki doesn’t mention it; words would break the moment, so they stand and watch for a few long minutes as the red and purple mix like food coloring.

“When did it get so late,” Maki says, more a statement than a question. Her senses are still fuzzy, if she’s being honest. “Let’s go home.” Unspoken: _let’s walk together._

“Let’s see how your upper body strength is coming along! Carry me down the steps,” Nozomi says. She is bending over, exposing _items_ (like the front-clasp of her bra, and Maki should be ashamed how quickly her eyes go there), and grinning like a hyena. (Or, perhaps, she is grinning like one of those tanuki statues sitting by the fence.) Maki tries not to choke.

“You’re joking,” she says, preparing herself for the possibility that Nozomi isn’t. The third-year keeps the straight face for all of three seconds.

“Mhm,” Nozomi almost-giggles, and Maki lets out the breath she was holding. “Unless you _want to_ try and—“

“Get us some towels already.”

_Myth: Neither Maki Nishikino nor Nozomi Tojo can be honest with their feelings._

_Fact: They can; it just takes a little bit of obfuscation and a lot of magic._

_\--_

_Myth: The old man who tends the shrine will get upset about Nozomi shirking her work for ten minutes._

_Fact: When Nozomi comes through with Maki to say ‘I’m going home,’ their faces still flushed and hair still damp, he just chuckles and says ‘ah, young love.’_


End file.
